Is Prince William about to make Kate a Princess?
Jun 05, 2008
DURING the run-up to his 21st birthday celebrations, Prince William confided to a close woman friend: “Why would anyone want to go out with me?†With these exasperated words, he was not suggesting that women found him unattractive.
There is a lot of speculation in the UK that Prince William and girlfriend Kate Middleton will get engaged this year. But 26-year-old Middleton still remains a mystery to British media. Daily Telegraph’s Andrew Alderson attempts to demystify the girl that has captured the imagination of many Britons
DURING the run-up to his 21st birthday celebrations, Prince William confided to a close woman friend: “Why would anyone want to go out with me?†With these exasperated words, he was not suggesting that women found him unattractive.
Rather, he could not understand why any young woman would tolerate the intrusions into her private life that would come with being his girlfriend.
There have undoubtedly been times when Kate Middleton has privately echoed his sentiments and wondered what she has let herself in for by dating the man destined to become the country’s 42nd monarch.
She has had her past raked over in the hunt for a scandal, she has been pursued around the clock by up to 20 photographers and, perhaps worst of all, her family has been publicly ridiculed.
Yet Middleton has emerged relatively unscathed from it all and her relationship with Prince William has survived, even thrived, despite their brief separation last year.
Today they are so much an ‘item’ that Middleton went to RAF Cranwell, in Lincolnshire, last month to see her prince receive his ‘wings’, even though royal watchers had predicted that she would not be invited to such a public, family-oriented event.
Her position in the royal fold became even stronger recently when she attended the wedding of William’s cousin Peter Phillips even though William was away in Kenya.
And last week, Middleton enjoyed a Holiday with William before his three-month attachment with the royal navy.
Bookmakers are now refusing to take bets on whether the couple will get engaged. “For us, it is a case of when not if,†said Rupert Adams, a spokesman for William Hill.
Retailers are equally convinced that a royal wedding is looming. Woolworths has 100,000 products ready to roll out within 48 hours of an announcement, including commemorative plates saying, ‘Celebrating the royal marriage of William & Kate.’
But despite the couple’s relationship being in its fifth year, Middleton remains an enigma.
Background
Catherine Elizabeth Middleton was born on January 9, 1982, the first of three children of Carole and Michael Middleton.
Her father was an airline officer, but Mr Middleton and his wife, an air stewardess, turned their backs on the industry to launch a business, Party Pieces, providing accessories for children’s parties.
At 13, Middleton complained of being unhappy at her school. Her parents moved her to Marlborough College.
It was at Marlborough that Middleton first became attracted to Prince William — long before the couple met.
While other girls had posters of actors, pop stars and footballers on their walls, Middleton had a large photograph of the Prince, who is five months her junior and was then at Eton.
At Marlborough, Middleton was academic and sporty, representing her school at netball, tennis, hockey and cross-country.
After she was confirmed as Prince William’s girlfriend in April 2004, reporters were desperate to discover tales of drug-taking and debauchery during her time at school.
Yet the nearest anyone got to a scandal was the revelation by a former schoolfriend from Marlborough, that the teenage Middleton used to ‘moon’ (bare her bottom) out of her dormitory window. The schoolgirl sense of mischief simply enhanced her reputation.
It is unclear whether Middleton put her name down for the University of St. Andrews before or after it was revealed that Prince William was going there to study history of art. But in 2001, Middleton found herself in the same hall of residence as Prince William.
However, after just one term, William wanted to leave the university.
Middleton was influential in helping him to appreciate university life, but they did not date during their first academic year.
Instead, she had a relationship lasting several months with a fellow student, whom a friend of both students described as ‘a charming, wonderful guy’.
Yet, by the end of their first year, Middleton was such a good friend of the Prince that she was one of three students chosen to share a town house with him during their second year.
But she has always had everything Prince William looks for in a girl: she is attractive, intelligent, fun and loyal.
It was during her second year that Middleton again showed she could be daring as well as discreet.
For a student fashion show, she sashayed down the catwalk in a see-through slip over black underwear.
In an interview in June 2003 Prince William said he did not have a steady girlfriend.
So, if he and Middleton were not a couple by then, they became one later that year. For the next two years, they lived with two fellow students in a cottage a short distance from St Andrews. One female student told me: “Kate was a lovely, down-to-earth girl.â€
Prince William and Middleton were often seen in town together, but it was all very low- key.
It was always going to be harder for Middleton after the couple left St Andrews in 2005. Unlike her boyfriend, she had no palace walls to retreat behind, no protection officer to see off unwanted attention and no clearly chosen route.
For the past three years, Middleton has not pursued the fulfilling career that her intelligence, education and good contacts could have given her.
In 2006, she worked as an accessories buyer for Jigsaw, a fashion chain. But soon photographers started pursuing her.
To this day, Middleton faces intrusions which, friends say, vary from the ‘mildly irritating to the totally unacceptable’.
Such tensions may have contributed to the fact that the couple split up in April last year.
Friends say the relationship hit a difficult point when Prince William was based with his Army pals at Bovingdon camp, in Dorset.
Friends say Middleton felt that William was not making enough effort to visit her. Similarly, Prince William is said to have become irritated that Middleton was becoming ‘clingy’. So the couple ended their four-year relationship.
Although Middleton was undoubtedly upset, she was determined not to show it. On the evening the split was confirmed, she went out on a girls’ night. Within only days, Prince William was telephoning Middleton, then they were seeing each other as ‘friends’.
Geordie Greig, the editor of Tatler, says of the reunion: “It speaks loudly that they do love each other.â€
Few doubt the couple’s affection for each other and it is endearing that, so long into their relationship, Prince William should still want to show off to his girlfriend, so much so that he was prepared to risk public condemnation last month by landing an RAF Chinook helicopter outside her parents’ home.
The Queen has met Middleton and likes her, while Prince Charles is fond of her, too.
However, one contemporary of Middleton was critical, saying she found her ‘dull’ and suspected she was on ‘a mission’ to be future queen. “At school, Catherine was really jolly hockey sticks, fun and jump in the dirt — a great girl,†she said. “Now she seems much more concerned about her image. That is what I have found a bit off.â€
Yet Middleton remains spirited. When a friend said she was fortunate to be going out with Prince William, she flashed back the response: “He is lucky to be going out with me.â€
Since she quit her job at Jigsaw last year her life has been in ‘limbo’.
She is reluctant to launch her own business because she would be criticised for cashing in on her royal connections. And few employers would relish the media scrutiny that comes with employing her.
Instead, Middleton is learning photography and last November organised an exhibition for Alistair Morrison, the celebrity portrait photographer.
Life is rarely straightforward for Kate.
Even when she tried to raise money for charity last summer by joining the Sisterhood, a group of women rowing a Chinese dragon boat across the Channel, she was forced to pull out when one of the team tipped off photographers about their training sessions.
Few doubt that should Prince William and Middleton eventually marry, their relationship will have a far better chance of success than his father’s troubled marriage to Diana, Princess of Wales.
Daily Telegraph
DURING the run-up to his 21st birthday celebrations, Prince William confided to a close woman friend: “Why would anyone want to go out with me?†With these exasperated words, he was not suggesting that women found him unattractive.
Rather, he could not understand why any young woman would tolerate the intrusions into her private life that would come with being his girlfriend.
There have undoubtedly been times when Kate Middleton has privately echoed his sentiments and wondered what she has let herself in for by dating the man destined to become the country’s 42nd monarch.
She has had her past raked over in the hunt for a scandal, she has been pursued around the clock by up to 20 photographers and, perhaps worst of all, her family has been publicly ridiculed.
Yet Middleton has emerged relatively unscathed from it all and her relationship with Prince William has survived, even thrived, despite their brief separation last year.
Today they are so much an ‘item’ that Middleton went to RAF Cranwell, in Lincolnshire, last month to see her prince receive his ‘wings’, even though royal watchers had predicted that she would not be invited to such a public, family-oriented event.
Her position in the royal fold became even stronger recently when she attended the wedding of William’s cousin Peter Phillips even though William was away in Kenya.
And last week, Middleton enjoyed a Holiday with William before his three-month attachment with the royal navy.
Bookmakers are now refusing to take bets on whether the couple will get engaged. “For us, it is a case of when not if,†said Rupert Adams, a spokesman for William Hill.
Retailers are equally convinced that a royal wedding is looming. Woolworths has 100,000 products ready to roll out within 48 hours of an announcement, including commemorative plates saying, ‘Celebrating the royal marriage of William & Kate.’
But despite the couple’s relationship being in its fifth year, Middleton remains an enigma.
Background
Catherine Elizabeth Middleton was born on January 9, 1982, the first of three children of Carole and Michael Middleton.
Her father was an airline officer, but Mr Middleton and his wife, an air stewardess, turned their backs on the industry to launch a business, Party Pieces, providing accessories for children’s parties.
At 13, Middleton complained of being unhappy at her school. Her parents moved her to Marlborough College.
It was at Marlborough that Middleton first became attracted to Prince William — long before the couple met.
While other girls had posters of actors, pop stars and footballers on their walls, Middleton had a large photograph of the Prince, who is five months her junior and was then at Eton.
At Marlborough, Middleton was academic and sporty, representing her school at netball, tennis, hockey and cross-country.
After she was confirmed as Prince William’s girlfriend in April 2004, reporters were desperate to discover tales of drug-taking and debauchery during her time at school.
Yet the nearest anyone got to a scandal was the revelation by a former schoolfriend from Marlborough, that the teenage Middleton used to ‘moon’ (bare her bottom) out of her dormitory window. The schoolgirl sense of mischief simply enhanced her reputation.
It is unclear whether Middleton put her name down for the University of St. Andrews before or after it was revealed that Prince William was going there to study history of art. But in 2001, Middleton found herself in the same hall of residence as Prince William.
However, after just one term, William wanted to leave the university.
Middleton was influential in helping him to appreciate university life, but they did not date during their first academic year.
Instead, she had a relationship lasting several months with a fellow student, whom a friend of both students described as ‘a charming, wonderful guy’.
Yet, by the end of their first year, Middleton was such a good friend of the Prince that she was one of three students chosen to share a town house with him during their second year.
But she has always had everything Prince William looks for in a girl: she is attractive, intelligent, fun and loyal.
It was during her second year that Middleton again showed she could be daring as well as discreet.
For a student fashion show, she sashayed down the catwalk in a see-through slip over black underwear.
In an interview in June 2003 Prince William said he did not have a steady girlfriend.
So, if he and Middleton were not a couple by then, they became one later that year. For the next two years, they lived with two fellow students in a cottage a short distance from St Andrews. One female student told me: “Kate was a lovely, down-to-earth girl.â€
Prince William and Middleton were often seen in town together, but it was all very low- key.
It was always going to be harder for Middleton after the couple left St Andrews in 2005. Unlike her boyfriend, she had no palace walls to retreat behind, no protection officer to see off unwanted attention and no clearly chosen route.
For the past three years, Middleton has not pursued the fulfilling career that her intelligence, education and good contacts could have given her.
In 2006, she worked as an accessories buyer for Jigsaw, a fashion chain. But soon photographers started pursuing her.
To this day, Middleton faces intrusions which, friends say, vary from the ‘mildly irritating to the totally unacceptable’.
Such tensions may have contributed to the fact that the couple split up in April last year.
Friends say the relationship hit a difficult point when Prince William was based with his Army pals at Bovingdon camp, in Dorset.
Friends say Middleton felt that William was not making enough effort to visit her. Similarly, Prince William is said to have become irritated that Middleton was becoming ‘clingy’. So the couple ended their four-year relationship.
Although Middleton was undoubtedly upset, she was determined not to show it. On the evening the split was confirmed, she went out on a girls’ night. Within only days, Prince William was telephoning Middleton, then they were seeing each other as ‘friends’.
Geordie Greig, the editor of Tatler, says of the reunion: “It speaks loudly that they do love each other.â€
Few doubt the couple’s affection for each other and it is endearing that, so long into their relationship, Prince William should still want to show off to his girlfriend, so much so that he was prepared to risk public condemnation last month by landing an RAF Chinook helicopter outside her parents’ home.
The Queen has met Middleton and likes her, while Prince Charles is fond of her, too.
However, one contemporary of Middleton was critical, saying she found her ‘dull’ and suspected she was on ‘a mission’ to be future queen. “At school, Catherine was really jolly hockey sticks, fun and jump in the dirt — a great girl,†she said. “Now she seems much more concerned about her image. That is what I have found a bit off.â€
Yet Middleton remains spirited. When a friend said she was fortunate to be going out with Prince William, she flashed back the response: “He is lucky to be going out with me.â€
Since she quit her job at Jigsaw last year her life has been in ‘limbo’.
She is reluctant to launch her own business because she would be criticised for cashing in on her royal connections. And few employers would relish the media scrutiny that comes with employing her.
Instead, Middleton is learning photography and last November organised an exhibition for Alistair Morrison, the celebrity portrait photographer.
Life is rarely straightforward for Kate.
Even when she tried to raise money for charity last summer by joining the Sisterhood, a group of women rowing a Chinese dragon boat across the Channel, she was forced to pull out when one of the team tipped off photographers about their training sessions.
Few doubt that should Prince William and Middleton eventually marry, their relationship will have a far better chance of success than his father’s troubled marriage to Diana, Princess of Wales.
Daily Telegraph